


your days in one

by ohtempora



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: Established Relationship, Light Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-09-23 23:08:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17089475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohtempora/pseuds/ohtempora
Summary: Troy sounds fuckin’ exhausted on the other end of the phone. Josh can’t blame him. It’s been a long week. It’s been a long year.





	your days in one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ewidentnie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ewidentnie/gifts).



> HAPPY NEW YEAR EWIDENTNIE I HOPE YOU ENJOY THIS <3

“So, Atlanta?”

Troy sounds fuckin’ exhausted on the other end of the phone. Josh can’t blame him. It’s been a long week. It’s been a long year.

“Hey, the front office there, I could talk to Alex,” Josh says. “See if they need an infielder. You never know.”

“My agent’s handling it,” Troy says. “There’s, y’know. A few teams out there who’ve said stuff. That I could start. I”m not gonna be unemployed.”

“I know,” Josh says. “Wasn’t trying to — Tulo, I know.”

They both fall silent. Josh is at home, draped over his living room couch. He did all the media for signing with the Braves, filled out all the paperwork. He’s got the contract guaranteed, at least for another year. Soon he’ll have to start thinking about finding an apartment in Atlanta, finding a place to stay for spring training that’s not Dunedin. Small potatoes, really.

Troy's got $38 million coming to him, but he still got straight-up cut. Baseball’s a business, Josh knows that as well as anyone, but it’s cold.

“You gonna tell me before you sign, or will I find out from Twitter?”

“I’ll tell you,” Troy says. “Jesus, what kind of question—”

He cuts himself off, too. Josh is already kicking himself. Talking to Troy is harder over the phone. Last season, like the season before that, it was so easy — it’s been easy for so long that he’s forgotten what it was like when they first met. Brief awkwardness, stumbling around each other before they settled in. He’d wanted to kiss Troy, hadn’t known if that was reciprocated. And then it worked out and they had each other, and nothing else felt like it’d fuckin’ matter.

All the injuries between the two of them, the trade to Cleveland, all that felt temporary, even when they knew they were hurtling towards an end.

“I know you’ll tell me,” Josh says. “I guess you don’t have to, like. Consult me, whatever.” He knows that even if Troy came to Atlanta, it wouldn’t make their lives like 2015 again.

“I’ll call you once I know all the options.”

“Alright.”

Josh doesn’t know how to talk about this, is the problem. Well — he knows with relationships it’s the good and the bad, that you work and you work and the work’s hard. He wasn’t prepared for them to spiral apart like this so quick, their bodies, the tools that made their careers, up and failing them both.

“Hey, you know there’s shit I gotta deal with, and the holidays, but—” Josh coughs, doesn’t know how to say it. “I haven’t seen you since the season ended.” It was one weekend, right when Cleveland was knocked unceremoniously from the playoffs. Troy flew to his hotel in Ohio and fucked it all out of him, until Josh stopped caring about the loss for a while, stopped caring about being a hired gun. Cared instead about Troy’s hands on him, Troy’s dick splitting him open, his eyes squeezed shut until he stopped seeing the final strike of the series and saw only stars.

It never gets easier.

Then Troy went home to keep rehabbing and Josh met with his agent to look over contract offers with too many zeroes attached.

“I know, yeah.” Troy hums. “I’ll figure it out, if I have to meet with teams? Do a private workout? I don’t know.”

He wasn’t expecting to be a free agent for two more years. Josh won’t make him say it.

“What about New Year’s or something? Don’t need to go out. Can get drunk off champagne anywhere.” No one’ll be signing contracts during the holidays. They might actually have some time.

“Oh,” Troy says, sounds surprised. “Actually, that might work. Do you wanna come here?”

“You coming down to Alabama?”

“I would,” Troy says, gone all quiet again. “If you wanted, I would.”

One day Josh won’t stick his foot in his mouth around Troy. One day they’ll go back to being easy with each other. They’ve just gotta get through the next few months, get through the winter, see how the chips fall in spring training. He's got faith in Troy to play like he used to.

“Nah, I’ll come to you. Long as you buy the champagne. I want something fancy to ring in 2019, though. Moet at a minimum.”

“Like you know anything about champagne.”

“I know price tags, baby,” Josh says, pitching his voice the sleaziest he can manage, and Troy laughs so hard he’s gasping on the other end of the phone.

“Yeah, alright,” he says. “I’ll buy you some fancy big-ass bottle of champagne, you fucker.”

“I’m buying my flight right now,” Josh tells him. “This is it, no takebacks.” He does actually pull up flights on his tablet. It doesn't matter what flight he's on, as long as Troy meets him at the airport. “You're picking me up, right?”

“Do I have to have the bottle of champagne with me?”

“Strapped into the front seat. That's how big I want it to be.”

Troy laughs at that again, warmer this time, and something surges in Josh’s chest.

It’s hard. They used to have each other, quiet and simple, understood what it was between them. Josh thinks he said ‘I love you’ a thousand times — screamed it in Troy’s face on the baseball field after big wins, rasped it out in bed — but he never said it enough when it counted.

“Hey,” Josh says. “I miss you when you’re not here, okay? I know it’s not, like. I’m picking Atlanta, and I picked it before — y’know. With the Jays doing what they did. But either way I’d miss you the whole damn season.”

Troy’s silent for a while, and Josh listens to him breathe on the other end of the phone, can picture the face he’s making, turning over Josh’s words in his head.

“I know,” he says finally, when the silence seems an inch too long. “I know.”

“Okay.” Josh blows out some air, picks a flight at random. There’s a layover, but it leaves early. Sounds good to him. “I'll see you at arrivals in a coupla days, then.”

“Sounds good.”

“I miss you,” Josh adds, one more time, because he wants to and he thinks he has to.

“You too,” Troy says. He pauses. “Actually kinda stupid how much. But I’ll see you soon.”

Josh hangs up, and looks around his apartment, and starts to think about packing, even though it’s too early for it. Just being together, he’s looking forward to it. It’ll be good.  


End file.
